


The Theory of Interstellar Trade

by primeideal



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Space, Community: makinghugospin, Drabble Sequence, Gen, IN SPACE!, Interstellar trade, Reverse Chronology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-03
Updated: 2013-11-03
Packaged: 2017-12-31 10:20:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1030542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/primeideal/pseuds/primeideal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kinkmeme prompt: Outer Space AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Theory of Interstellar Trade

**Author's Note:**

> This is one of my most popular stories, but I have no idea where anyone is finding it. If you've been linked here from offsite, could you please let me know how you came across it? I'm hopelessly baffled.
> 
> Thanks for reading!

“I'm telling you, it's nothing strange,” Jean Valjean protested to the impassive robo-nurse. “My body's old, that's all. Homesickness will do that to you—I was never meant to live for years and years in a banged-up space station like this. Don't worry about me.”  
  
“Your files point to many healthy years in multiple gravitational fields.”  
  
“In a penal colony on a backwater asteroid!”  
  
“I will recalculate your recommended dosages.”  
  
Valjean shook his head. He didn't expect the android to understand. But his planet's streets and houses, gardens and hideaways...no, none of their simulations could quite reproduce the sensation of home.  
  
*  
  
“Warning! Security protocol violated! Risk of interplanetary contamination: high.”  
  
The older boy gripped his brother's hand protectively as a containment droid floated overhead. “We didn't do nothing!” he protested.  
  
“Introducing unwanted life-forms into the environs of this space duck is a Class C punishable—”  
  
“Oh, come now, boys will be boys,” said an Elephantine commander, her green skin glowing in the droid's light. “Hello, you two. Are you lost?”  
  
“Dunno,” the younger murmured, glancing from the birds to her insignia while not letting go of his brother.   
  
“We'll look out for you,” she promised. “You could become space cadets yet.”  
  
*  
  
“Look, what does it _matter_? Even if all this parallel universe theories are bunk, and they probably are, there's still a pretty-much-infinite universe out there. Tyrants on any planet. You could go _anywhere_ with this wormhole tech, and you're risking it all to take down one guy who's not even that terrible. What's all that relativity stuff for, anyway? It's all the same, there's no such thing as progress—”  
  
“Grantaire, I know you don't do square roots, but if you can't tell the difference between special relativity, which we use, and ethical relativism, which we don't, the airlock's that way.”  
  
*  
  
“Any word on the fugitive?”  
  
“No. We've tried triangulating him, but we think he's off the galactic positioning system.”  
  
“Understood. Allocate your resources wherever's efficient, I'll handle this myself.”  
  
The stars. Each in its season could be harnessed for cheap solar energy, and each allowed spaceships to set their courses. They never looked the same because of the observers' changing relative positions, and because they relied on different fusion methods given their size and age. They were tools to navigate by, shedding many lights on creatures voyaging among them.  
  
And Javert would use any tool it took to capture Valjean.  
  
*  
  
“Oh, darling, I've missed you so much!”  
  
“You too, dear, but I promise it's worth it. Look how much I earned, just from scavenging the inner planets! My spacesuit has more than paid for itself!”  
  
“I just want you to be careful, is all. It's dangerous out there.”  
  
“Yes, but if I get to the flotsam and jetsam early enough, the time dilation won't have taken much effect; I can sell the dead organisms' biotech at a profit!”  
  
“Darling, everyone knows that the values eventually stabilize, it's not time-dependent.”  
  
“Oh, they say that,” Thenardier grinned, “but they don't know me.”  
  
*  
  
“My goodness! It's an octopod fossil!”  
  
“Do you think so?”  
  
“Of course! The xenobiologists have been excavating here! We'll have to tell them about this, it's very exciting.”  
  
“Some people would be surprised that you care so much about xenobiology.”  
  
He shrugged, and looked out into the horizon of the twin suns. The universe was vast and dazzling, and full of life and beauty. Even on their small planet, God's creation had brought forth untold marvels out of nothing. One act of love could shake the entire cosmos as well as worlds unseen. “Some people,” said the bishop, “are wrong.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Paul Krugman's paper. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Theory_of_Interstellar_Trade


End file.
